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A gangster is a criminal who is a member of a gang. Most gangs are considered to be part of organized crime. Gangsters are also called mobsters, a term derived from mob and the suffix -ster. Gangs provide a level of organization and resources that support much larger and more complex criminal transactions than an individual criminal could achieve. Gangsters have been active for many years in countries around the world. Gangsters are the subject of many novels, films, television series, and video games.
James Joseph "Whitey" Bulger Jr. was an American organized crime boss who led the Winter Hill Gang, an Irish Mob group in the Winter Hill neighborhood of Somerville, Massachusetts, a city directly northwest of Boston. On December 23, 1994, Bulger fled the Boston area and went into hiding after his former FBI handler, John Connolly, tipped him off about a pending RICO indictment against him. Bulger remained at large for sixteen years. After his 2011 arrest, federal prosecutors tried Bulger for nineteen murders based on grand jury testimony from Kevin Weeks and other former criminal associates.
The United Bamboo Gang, also known as the Bamboo Union, is the largest of Taiwan's three main criminal Triads. They are reported to have roughly 200,000 members. The membership consists largely of waishengren and has had historic ties to the Kuomintang; they are said to be motivated as much by political ideology as by profit. They are known to simply call themselves "businessmen", but in reality, are also involved in organized killings and drug trafficking. The gang gained global notoriety when it became directly involved in politics in the early 1980s.
Larry Hoover is an American former gangster and street gang kingpin. He is the founder of the Chicago street gang, the Gangster Disciples.
The Irish Mob is a usually crime family–based ethnic collective of organized crime syndicates composed of primarily ethnic Irish members which operate primarily in Ireland, the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia, and have been in existence since the early 19th century. Originating in Irish-American street gangs – famously first depicted in Herbert Asbury's 1927 book, The Gangs of New York – the Irish Mob has appeared in most major U.S. and Canadian cities, especially in the Northeast and the urban industrial Midwest, including Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Cleveland, and Chicago.
The Serbian mafia, or Serbian organized crime, are various criminal organizations based in Serbia or composed of ethnic Serbs in the former Yugoslavia and Serbian diaspora. The organizations are primarily involved in smuggling, arms trafficking, drug trafficking, human trafficking, assassinations, heists, assault, protection rackets, murder, money laundering and illegal gambling. Ethnic Serb organized crime groups are organized horizontally; higher-ranked members are not necessarily coordinated by any leader. According to criminologists and law enforcement authorities, the Serbian mafia is the most powerful in Europe.
Albanian mafia or Albanian organized crime are the general terms used for criminal organizations based in Albania or composed of ethnic Albanians. Albanian organized crime is active in Europe, North America, South America, and various other parts of the world including the Middle East and Asia. The Albanian mafia participates in a diverse range of criminal enterprises including trafficking in drugs, arms, and humans. Due to their close ties with the 'Ndrangheta of Calabria, they control a large part of the billion dollar wholesale cocaine market in Europe and appear to be the primary distributors of cocaine in various European drug hubs including London. Albanian organized crime is characterized by diversified criminal enterprises which, in their complexity, demonstrate a very high criminal capacity. In Albania, there are over 15 mafia families that control organized crime.
Frank Lucas was an American drug lord who operated in Harlem, New York City, during the late 1960s and early 1970s. He was known for cutting out middlemen in the drug trade and buying heroin directly from his source in the Golden Triangle in Southeast Asia. Lucas boasted that he smuggled heroin using the coffins of dead American servicemen, as depicted in the feature film American Gangster (2007), which fictionalized aspects of his life. This claim was denied by his Southeast Asian associate Leslie "Ike" Atkinson.
The Patriarca crime family, also known as the New England Mafia, the Boston Mafia, the Providence Mafia or the Office, is an Italian-American Mafia crime family operating in New England. The family consists of two distinct factions, one based in Providence, Rhode Island, and the other in Boston, Massachusetts. The Patriarca family is primarily active in Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut, with other territory throughout New England.
Peter Chong is an organized crime figure previously convicted of racketeering and extortion who has been described by prosecutors as the former leader of the Wo Hop To syndicate in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
The 14K is a triad group based in Hong Kong but active internationally. It is the second largest triad group in the world with around 20,000 members split into thirty subgroups. They are the main rival of the Sun Yee On, which is the largest triad.
In 2010, a number of events took place in organized crime. On the first day of the year, reporter Jose Luis Romero was kidnapped for reporting on the Mexican Mafia. While investigating the kidnapping, policeman Jesus Escalante was killed. The Mexican Drug War is an armed conflict taking place between rival drug cartels and government forces in Mexico. Mexican drug cartels, or drug trafficking organizations, have become more powerful since the demise of Colombia's Cali and Medellín cartels in the 1990s. Mexican drug cartels now dominate the illicit drug market in the United States. Arrests of key cartel leaders, particularly in the Tijuana and Gulf cartels, have led to increasing drug violence as cartels fight for control of the trafficking routes into the United States.
Armenian Power 13, also known as AP, the Armenian Mob, or Armenian Mafia is an Armenian criminal organization and street gang founded and currently based in Los Angeles County, California. They are involved in drug trafficking, murder, assault, fraud, identity theft, illegal gambling, kidnapping, racketeering, robbery and extortion. They are believed to have around 200 members and hundreds of associates, according to the U.S. attorney’s office. They are also well known for their connections with the Mexican Mafia.
A triad is a Chinese transnational organized crime syndicate based in Greater China with outposts in various countries having significant overseas Chinese populations.
Gangsters: America's Most Evil is a documentary television series that airs on Reelz which profiles notorious criminals whose crimes involve murder, drug trafficking, racketeering, and human trafficking. Most, if not all of, the criminals profiled in this series were either brought to justice by local, state, and federal law enforcement or were killed as a part of their criminal enterprises.
Cape Verdean organized crime refers to the various criminal organizations that are active in Cape Verde & Cape Verdean diaspora communities. Cape Verde is important as a transshipment point in the cocaine trade, and the existence of sizeable Cape Verdean communities in New England, the Dutch port city of Rotterdam as well as in several cities in Portugal, France and Switzerland, led to the formation of criminal gangs in the community active in the international drug trade supplemented with other criminal activities. Cape Verdean organized crime primarily comes in the form of street gangs, with varying levels of organization and sophistication.
The Ping On was a Boston-based criminal organization. The organization rose to power in the 1970s and continued to operate throughout the 1980s, 1990s and early 2000s. The Ping On was founded by Stephen "Sky Dragon" Tse who had heavy ties to the infamous 14K Triad in Hong Kong.
The Boston Chinatown massacre or Tyler Street Massacre was a gang-related shooting in which five men were killed execution-style in a Boston Chinatown gambling den in the early morning hours of January 12, 1991. A sixth victim was seriously injured but survived. While no motive has been officially established, initial police reports and later Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) investigations indicated that the Ping On gang and one of the victims were vying for power in Boston Chinatown.
The Kinahan Organised Crime Group (KOCG), also known as the Kinahan Cartel, is a major Irish transnational organised crime syndicate alleged to be the most powerful in Ireland and one of the largest organised crime groups in the world. It is also established in the UK, Spain, and the United Arab Emirates. It was founded by Christy Kinahan in the 1990s. His eldest son Daniel manages the day-to-day operations of the family's criminal group. Estimated reports have credited them with wealth of up to €1 billion.
References
- ↑ Announcement of the United States Attorney's Office on the FBI website
- 1 2 3 4 5 "This White Dude Was a Boss in the Chinese Mafia". Vice. December 19, 2015.
- 1 2 "Chinatown's 'White Devil John' Sentenced To 20 Years". NPR. August 16, 2013.
- 1 2 3 "The White Devil Kingpin". Rolling Stone. February 18, 2015. Archived from the original on March 3, 2016. Retrieved September 2, 2017.
- ↑ "Dorchester man indicted in federal court for alleged criminal activity as Chinatown gang leader - The Boston Globe". BostonGlobe.com. Retrieved 2015-12-20.
- ↑ "Warner Bros. Picks Director James Gray for Boston Film 'White Devil'". Boston Magazine. Archived from the original on 2015-12-22. Retrieved 2015-12-20.
- ↑ "Leader of Drug and Money Laundering Conspiracy Receives 20 Years in Federal Prison". Federal Bureau of Investigation. August 15, 2013.
- ↑ "John Willis". Federal Bureau of Prisons. Retrieved December 20, 2015.[ not specific enough to verify ]
- ↑ "Warner Bros Sets James Gray For Boston Crime Thriller 'White Devil'". Deadline. August 13, 2013.
- ↑ "Bob Halloran delivers 'Devil' of a tale detailing Dorchester gangster's rise in Chinese mafia". www.bostonherald.com. 6 January 2016. Retrieved 2016-03-07.